We might be going out on a limb here, but we're guessing that most of our readers aren't hardcore Civil War historians. And since VH-1 discontinued their I Love the ... series before they got around to the 1860s, a lot of us are walking around with Civil War misinformation firmly wired in our brains. Now is as good a time as ever to clear up some of those myths. Such as ...

#6. The Emancipation Proclamation Ended Slavery in the United States

It only makes sense that we'd think of the Emancipation Proclamation as the law that freed the slaves; "emancipation" is right there in the title. It's like calling something the "Patriot Act" and then not legislating that everyone wear American flags capes, festoon their cars with airbrushed bald eagles and sing that Lee Greenwood song at dinner every night. Of course the Emancipation Proclamation freed the slaves. What else would it do?

Getty"The right to vote? Don't push it, guys."

Why it's Bullshit:

It freed some of them. Thanks to a loophole, about a million individuals were still legally slaves after the EP (there were about four million slaves in captivity at the time; it declared three million of them free). The loophole was that the proclamation only applied to states and territories "in rebellion against the United States." In short, if you were a slave in Delaware, Kentucky or even the recently-captured Confederate territories of New Orleans or Tennessee ... sorry, but your freedom-princess was in another castle.

Why did Lincoln only go half-way? Because as far as political waffling goes, the Emancipation Proclamation was Lincoln's masterpiece. Yes, Lincoln personally detested slavery, but abolition was still a touchy subject on account of four border states remaining loyal to the Union while still being hardcore slave states. There was also the matter of turning the war into a crusade to end slavery, which frankly was not the kind of thing your average Northerner would gladly have his head exploded over.

In Lincoln's own words, "I would do it if I were not afraid that half the officers would fling down their arms and three more states would rise."

GettyLincoln: Just wanted to get home from the office early and have a bit of a sit down, really.

If this sounds out of character for the side that was trying to rescue Africans from bondage, we have to address another myth ...

#5. The North Was Anti-Racism

Ask a Southern Civil War enthusiast what the Civil War was really about, and he will probably give you one answer: States' rights. Ask anybody else and they'll probably give you another answer: Slavery. And if you think we're diving into that shitstorm here and now, you're mistaken. But it does reveal something about how most of us perceive the Civil War -- that the North was on the right side of history because they understood the fundamental truth that all men, no matter what color, were created equal.

Getty"As long as they don't rub it in our faces and take all our jobs."

Why it's Bullshit:

The North was so prejudice that white people acutally discriminated against other white people. So you can bet that life was not a bowl of cherries for nonwhites. And for blacks, the 19th century was nothing but a bowl of crap, no matter where you lived.

GettyAnd we can bet this is not the milk of human kindness.

True, the North had a larger number of abolitionists and progressives, but they also had blatantly racist laws preventing free black people from actually getting rights as citizens. And also, lynch mobs. Which was why it was the North, not the South, that hosted the country's most violent race riot in history. What started out as a protest against the Union's draft policy, ended as a full-on assault on any African-Americans unfortunate enough to exist and get caught.

Back in those days, freed blacks were exempt from the draft, probably so they could put more time into putting out their racially motivated house fires. This exemption didn't sit well with poor whites who couldn't afford the $300 to buy their way out of the draft -- and by "didn't sit well" we mean "infuriated to the point of a frenzied rage." By the end of the four-day riot, at least 11 blacks were lynched throughout Manhattan, hundreds more were assaulted and a children's orphanage was burned to the ground. It took no less than 4,000 federal troops fresh from Gettysburg to subdue the insurrection. New York City's black residents were so terrorized by the riots that by 1865, the black population plunged to the lowest it had been in 45 years.

Getty"Sunny, south-facing house in a friendly suburb. Nonsmoking tenants preferred, who don't mind the occasional burning cross in the front garden."

And if you're thinking the Draft Riots were one little blip in an otherwise happy and racially harmonic region, try again. Town Line, New York, successfully seceded from the Union altogether during the war and were not readmitted to the nation until ... no joke, 1946.

#4. The Confederate Flag Looked Like This

While the U.S. is likely to continue debating the display of the Confederate flag on everything from mudflaps to prom dresses ...

... it is reassuring to know that your average Connecticut Yankee and Confederate apologist can still agree on one thing: what the Confederate flag looked like.

GettyIt is now most often used by white bearded supremacists.

Why it's Bullshit:

The first Confederate flag was the "Stars and Bars" flag, which served as their official standard until 1863. It originally showed seven stars (and later 13) despite the fact that there were only 11 states in the Confederacy. These last two stars represented Kentucky and Missouri, states the South really wanted to secede but never got around to it. In short, these states were imaginary.

However, this flag ended up looking too much like the American flag on the battlefield, and by 1862 Confederates were already grumbling for a new flag that was as "unlike as possible to the Stars and Stripes of the United States." Their solution was a second design that incorporated the square "Battle Flag" of the Army of Northern Virginia onto a brilliant white sheet that would have made any white supremacist proud. However, in yet another fine example of Southern ingenuity, this "Stainless Banner" looked a lot like a flag of surrender. After two more years, it was dumped for being "too white" even by a slave-owning society's standards.

On March 4, 1865, with the war nearly over, the Confederate Congress decided "whatever" and adopted a third and final flag: "the Blood Stained Banner." It was the same as the previous design except with a vertical red bar so that it would not be confused with the actual flags of surrender the Confederates would start flying one month later. According to your most die-hard imaginary Confederate armies today, this third flag "is still the official flag of the Confederacy."

Now, we know what you're thinking: What the hell is that "Confederate flag" everyone keeps fighting over today? It's a dark blue variant of the Second Confederate Navy Jack. Although occasionally used on the battlefield as just one of countless regimental colors, this particular version enjoyed renewed popularity after its use by several "Rebel Companies" in the Pacific during WWII. Now completely misunderstood throughout the country today, this flag endures as a powerful symbol to how little the South should be trusted with their own Civil War history.